He brings up some really good points about Social media being to the point where it will not be growing any more. We’re past the top of the marketing bell curve. While I agree with this I don’t agree that it is dead by any means. To me this sounds a lot like the people who said that TV was done growing in popularity in the 60’s.

Social media is here to stay.

Social media has only helped communication evolve. AntiPR Guy says that the next generation will not have a blog or a podcast, they will simply text. I don’t see it. My son for example is definitely part of that generation. He’s 10 and he has just launched his own blog where he posts chapters from the books he is writing. As this next generation grows up I think much of their communication will be via texting but to say they won’t blog or podcast is just silly. Social Media isn’t dead. It’s evolving. Who can say what will be the next big thing in social media?

Now don’t get me wrong. Social media isn’t all it’s cracked up to be by many of today’s marketing analysts. It never has been. Sure it’s all the rage in marketing. “Does your new product have a Facebook fan page?” Social media is just the shiny new toy. It’s like when any new medium comes along, marketing types jump all over it because they don’t want to miss the gold rush if it just so happens that this is the thing that is going to replace the horribly unquantifiable advertising practices of the past. People are always looking for a magic bullet. They thought banner ads were it, and they thought spam was it, and they thought TV advertising was it.

Social media however is an effective tool when used right. It’s social. People are social, products are not social. But people like to socialize with other people who enjoy the sames things, including the same products. And when they feel that a certain brand connects with them, they share it with their “friends”. That’s when social media works for advertising, When it’s not really the social media doing the advertising it’s the users using social media to do what they would have done via a different medium in a different age.

What Social media really has going for it will still be here for quite a while. It’s the ability for something to spread very far, very fast. To go viral if you will in the true sense of the word, not the buzzword meaning but like Old Spice really did with their Old Spice Man earlier this year.

So here’s the way I see it in a nutshell. Social media is just another tool in available to advertiser and marketers. Potentially it’s a very powerful tool. And like I always tell my kids, “Use the right tool for the right job”. But just like any other tool, if you don’t know how to use it you’ll just look like an idiot. Kinda like when you see a guy trying to change his tire with a hammer.